Monday, January 7, 2019

Amanda Ripley from Alien: Isolation returns for another showdown with a deadly Xenomorph in Alien: Blackout mobile game.

Last year in January, 20th Century Fox has acquired developer Cold Iron Studios for their video game division FoxNext Games and they announced to have been working on a shooter title that is set on the sci-fi horror franchise of Alien, created by director Ridley Scott in 1979.

Then Alien: Blackout title being trademarked by Fox revealed the name of the game and it was about to be announced at The Game Awards 2018, which didn't happen in the end. The game has finally dropped a trailer and it turns out to be a premium mobile game.

The trailer gives away a survival horror type atmosphere the game offers where daughter of Ellen Ripley and the protagonist of Alien: Isolation, Amanda Ripley is shown to be locked with a Xenomorph aboard Weyland-Yutani space station.

Players will assume her role in a struggle to survive the deadliest species of the galaxy trying to outsmart her and the crew in every move. In order to stay alive, you could risk the lives of other crew members or try to rely on the damaged controls of the station.

Instead jumping with joy, people who eagerly waited for the reveal are giving the title a cold shoulder, because the game was rumored to be shooter title for PC and consoles but then turned out to be a mobile app that no one asked for.

Yes, the return of Amanda Ripley is really exciting for the fans that played the previous game but they wanted to play the new game on available major gaming platform and bringing the game on mobile after all this hype can simply turn out to be another greedy cashgrab attempt.

Apparently, many major video game companies are shifting their effort towards mobile game development these days, thus ruining beloved franchise for fans and looks like none of them has learned anything from the Diablo Immortal backlash at BlizzCon 2018.

Alien: Blackout, a direct sequel to Alien: Isolation will be coming soon on App Store, Google Play and Amazon App Store for playing on mobile devices priced $4.99 only. FoxNext has associated themselves with D3 Go, Theory Interactive and Rival Games for the project.

It was only a month ago, when we heard news of screenwriter Greg Russo has submitted his complete draft for the upcoming Resident Evil movie reboot to Constantin Films that is supposed to be produced by James Wan (Aquaman, The Conjuring).

It would have been a great fun for the curious audience to see how this successful director influences the movie with his classic style of horror but according to a recent report, Wan is no longer producing the upcoming film of RE franchise.

Wan was actually somewhat frustrated that the possibility of his involvement to the project was announced prematurely. In an interview with Bloody Disgusting, Wan cleared out that he is not doing it anymore as it has been dropped and then said the following.

It’s kind of annoying when things come and go, or things never came in the first place. I hate it when my projects get announced. It makes it seem like I’m attached to a lot of things when in fact I’m not necessarily doing so many things. A lot of my stuff just get announced and I don’t want them to be announced but people love to announce them.

Even though Wan is out from the anticipated project, he is still attached to do a remake of South Korean zombie apocalypse action thriller Train to Busan and wishes to do proper justice to it, because it is a very beloved property to him.

He is currently busy with his upcoming DC Extended Universe superhero movie Aquaman, which is inbound for December 21 and his company Atomic Monster will start working on Swamp Thing series for DC Universe right away.

Shortly after the end of Resident Evil movie franchise by director Paul W.S. Anderson (Alien vs. Predator, Death Race) directed and actress Milla Jovovich (The Fifth Element, Ultraviolet) with the release of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, a horror-centric reboot was announced.

RE movies had a six movie run that has grossed over $1 billion worldwide collectively. Even though Greg Russo wrote a script that will take the series back to the roots of horror just as the studio is interested in but he would very much like them to take a Texas Chainsaw Massacre-style approach.

Tuesday, December 11, 2018

The success of Netflix's Castlevania animated series is getting new PVC collectible statue for Trever Belmont in 2019.

You can tell that the collaboration of showrunner Adi Shankar (Dredd, The Grey) and comic-book writer Warren Ellis (Astonishing X-Men: Xenogenesis, Iron Man: Extremis) worked pretty well for Netflix's Castlevania TV series that they ran it for two seasons and renewed for another.

Based on the action-adventure gothic horror Konami game Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse from 1989, the show ha reinvigorated the franchise in gaming and has now led to production of cool collectibles of protagonist Trevor Belmont.

Renowned for creating various pop culture action figures and fan-favorite replicas, Diamond Choose Toys decided to cash in the success of the show and come up with a PVC statue for the whip wielding monster hunter from Belmont clan.

The early look that they have just revealed is a full-color, nearly nine inches tall PVC figure of Trevor in a window box, designed by Caesar and sculpted by Rocco Tartamella. From December 19th, the statue will be up for pre-order and will be priced $49.99 only when it arrives on store in summer 2019.

This striking pose of Trevor Belmont is a true spectacle that deserves a place on the shelves of series fans. Hopefully, Diamond Choose Toys will later come up with some unholy creatures from the same line that would look perfect right next to it.

Last month, we heard that Shankar is currently working on his upcoming Devil May Cry project, which is being developed as a Netflix original series ad is also assigned for an Assassin's Creed animated show that has yet to announce an official date.

Saturday, November 24, 2018

20th Century Fox trademarks the name "Alien: Blackout" for a possible upcoming video game title in the making.

After the science fiction horror franchise of Aliens began its journey back in 1979, it saw many sequel movies, crossovers with Predator film series, and most frequently adapted into comic-books by Dark Horse Comics publications and video game media for a several decades now.

It stepped into the world of video games in 1982 as maze game based on the original movie and got a dozen of releases on different platforms. Some recent developments from 20th Century Fox studio suggest that we are in for a new Alien game soon.

Back in January, it was revealed that FoxNext Games is about to work on a new AAA-Alien shooter title for PC and consoles in association with Cold Iron Studios, which will deliver a total action-packed experience full of Xenomorphs to all of the fans.

Also, there are speculations that very soon the game could even be announced at The Game Awards 2018. This rumor is powered by a recent photo posted by video game legend Hideo Kojima on Twitter during his tour at the 20th Century Fox office and the official Twitter account for TGA responds to it as well.

Another interesting part is that The Game Awards has been marketing this year's event with a tagline "Worlds Will Change" right next to a "W" logo. Some enthusiastic fans over the internet suggest this to be the Weyland-Yutani Corporation logo from Alien universe.

The similarities between the logo could be purely coincidental but it seems highly suspicious when the Twitter handle for The Game Awards responds to Kojima with their "Worlds Will Change" slogan in a cryptic manner of reply.

The closest and the most recent release from the series are Aliens: Colonial Marines and Alien: Isolation. The former took place right after the events of James Cameron's Aliens movie from 1986, which was gravely bashed by fans for a very poor AI as a result of a typo in code.

The latter came out after a year later as a first-person-shooter survival horror game from developer Creative Assembly and publisher Sega, which somehow managed to encapsulate the suspense and claustrophobic settings of the franchise right.

Aside from the recently title, we do not know any other news or information about the story of the game or whatsoever. However, now that 20th Century Fox has secured the trademark for them, we hope to hear more about the game soon and probably on December 6, at The Game Awards 2018.

If Hideo Kojima is really involved in the Alien: Blackout project, then there is a chance that the series may find redemption into the video game media after so many botched attempt to bring the Alien horde from the furthest corner of the galaxy to your preferred gaming platform.

Monday, November 19, 2018

Screenwriter Greg Russo revealed that he took inspiration from Resident Evil 7 for the script of Resident Evil movie reboot.

Long before the Paul W.S. Anderson (Alien vs. Predator, Death Race) directed and Milla Jovovich (The Fifth Element, Ultraviolet) starrer Resident Evil movie franchise ended with Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, there was announcement for a series reboot.

Although Anderson is not returning to direct again, Constantin Films are handling the project with screenwriter Greg Russo readying drafts and to be directed by James Wan (Aquaman, The Conjuring), which could be a delight to horror fans in general.

Russo has recently opened up in an interview about his writing process and how he took inspirations to follow Capcom's lead to re-inventing the series. One of the main aspects of that motto is to go back to the roots of horror in the first place for him.

For me it was very clear cut that I wanted to go back and make it scary again like a horror film in terms of the classic James Wan style so that was the pitch, going back and looking what made the games scary in the first place so yea Resident Evil 7 was a bit of a touchstone for my draft.

For years, fans have been complaining about the RE movies from director Anderson for moving far from the horror and making over-the-top action flicks. What they cannot deny that whether or not they were crappy movies, they made a ton of money and thankfully came to an end.

Though Russo did enjoy the films, but he believes that RE franchise has always prioritized the elements of horror first and then focused on action. And that is why; he chose to take writing inspiration from the terrifying 2017 game.

He would personally love to see a Resident Evil film made in Texas Chainsaw Massacre-style and centered on Baker Family. Then he wants Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson to jump in the middle as Chris Redfield and punch boulders for the ending scene.

Greg Russo has already handed over his draft to Constantin Films and looks like they are pretty content with what he came up with. James Wan is also producing the Resident Evil movie reboot and we expect him to come up with his classic style of horror.

The Halloween Sale 2018 from Humble Bundle is here to knock your socks off with spooky discounts and an awful lot of different games.

Halloween seem to be looking more festive than ever because of all the crazy sale offer going on everywhere and we've seen some pretty slick deals on horror games online. For the past few days, we've been watching and found the greatest deal of them all.

The digital storefront of Humble Bundle has some of the best assortment of titles for this year's Halloween that leaps beyond the wall of horror genre and rain on discounted price on so many games from different categories that it really is hard to keep track of.

The list is so big itself that we couldn't possibly list all of them in here but we thought we would pick up the ones that offer the best value in their current reduced price. So, we are picking titles from every sort and not limiting ourselves to just spooky titles. Also, any game you pick from this Halloween Sale 2018 will get you Murderous Pursuits for FREE too!

The base game of Dead by Daylight has offered 50% and there is a bunch of add-on content from the game as well as Dying Light that put forward 33-35% at best. We leave these completely on you. Outlast 2 however, is a nice catch at a whopping 70%.

We also opted out from picking some of the games from the sale even though they had a serious discount slapped on them, simply because they weren't worth the bucks for this festive season. Nevertheless, you don't need to be influenced by us and can still pick them up if you really want to.

To offer you great spooky titles for the best price, Steam Halloween Sale 2018 is here and lasts till November 1.

In case if your Halloween plans are not including being chased by Michael Myers while you hide behind the curtains or even go trick or treating dressing up, you can definitely celebrate this holiday with some good old selection of horror games.

Unless you have signed up for a selected lineup of games for Halloween terror from PlayStation Now or over Xbox Game Pass, you can always rely on other digital storefronts like Humble Bundle or Steam to get your hands on a slew of great games.

Speaking of which, Valve's digital distribution platform Steam has arranged a Halloween-themed sale that everyone who loves horror can enjoy. Basically any game that is dark and scary or has even a remote connection with either of those is in it and it runs from October 29 to November 1.

Rest of the games from their assortment is a pure gold mine for any horror fans and some of those discount rates are a real Halloween treat for sure. Let us mention some of them and then decide yourself whether or not you agree with us. We are okay with that.

Our suggestion is that you get Darkest Dungeon (-70%), Killing Floor 2 (-67%) and L4D2 (-80%) from the top seller list for the best value of your money. Then if you are ready to spend more, we would like to add a few more, from which you can even drop some.

Whether you pick or leave Friday the 13th: The Game (-85%) is up to you but try to consider picking from Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Castlevania: LoS 2, Darksiders II, Limbo and Zombie Army Trilogy as all of these five games are on 80% off.

For 75% off, Alien: Isolation, BioShock Remastered, Metro Redux Bundle and/or Outlast 2 can be yours. Dead Island Definitive Edition and Grim Dawn both comes for a 70% discount, which we would consider a decent deal but leaving them behind won't be a crime either.

The perks of getting your hands into this seasonal sale is that not only you will be claiming some of the great games in your library but many of these titles are having limited time Halloween-themed event that has its unique appeal to this spirit of holiday.

Saturday, July 28, 2018

Netflix’s Castlevania series drops a new trailer for upcoming second season and will start streaming on October 26.

Premiering with only 4 episodes in 2017, Season 1 of Castlevania anime adaptation became very successful and received critical acclaim. Developed for online streaming service Netflix, the series was based on a 1989 video game Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse from developer studio Konami and belongs to gothic fantasy game series of Castlevania. Executive producer Adi Shankar (Dredd, The Grey) has unveiled the official trailer on Twitter first, before adding them on Facebook and Instagram today.

A double-sized Season 2 takes us back to the struggle of monster-hunting Belmont clan against the lord of vampire, Vlad Dracula Tepes. Trevor Belmont tries his best to save humanity from the creature of the night under the command of their sinister lord. To stop his reign of insanity over the grief of his deceased wife Lisa Tepes, Dracula's son Alucard decides to step up and join his unlikely human allies to form a last stand against his father and his vampire war council before it is too late.

Aside from being a little too short in length, Castlevania animated TV series was meant to change standards for video game adaptation and it did by breaking a streak on Rotten Tomatoes. On the same year, Assassin’s Creed and Warcraft movies opened up to less favorable critical reception. This year, Hollywood superstar Dwayne Johnson (Baywatch, Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle) starrer monster flick Rampage debuted with a bang but then failed to keep up in long run.

Back in January, series writer Warren Ellis (Astonishing X-Men – Xenogenesis, Iron Man – Extremis) announced on Twitter that Castlevania series is returning to summer 2018 with eight episodes for this season and Netflix has announced that date to be October 26, 2018. Even though Season 2 hasn't still been aired, Richard Armitage voicing Trevor Belmont already revealed earlier that Season 3 is already in production, which shows their vast confidence on the series' success.

Friday, January 19, 2018

The animated TV series adaptation of Konami's fan-favorite action-adventure horror game series Castlevania by comic-book writer Warren Ellis (Astonishing X-Men: Xenogenesis, Iron Man: Extremis) and executive producer Adi Shankar (Dredd, The Grey), Castlevania on Netflix was exceptionally well received by the fans. As Netflix was interested for Castlevania Season 2 after the first Season, viewers are growing restless for it.

Ellis is the one who helped Adi Shankar to adapt this Netflix project on 1989's Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse from game developer studio Konami. When the online streaming network was pleased with the positive reception for the four episode-long Season 1 of Castlevania anime, they decided to continue with a second Season. However, there were no announcement on when the show will return again and everyone was kind of caught off in the show's success party.

The Tweet from Warren Ellis reveals that the show is returning this summer of 2018 and instead of only four episodes, they are doubling up the number to eight. Which means, we are about to witness a lot more blood, gore, sword fighting and whip-wielding action from the Belmont clan with the undead monsters of night this summer. We are excited to see Trevor Belmont (voiced by Richard Armitage), Sypha Belnades (voiced by Alejandra Reynoso) and Alucard (voiced by James Callis) to return for more adventure this Season.

Netflix’s Castlevania anime adaptation for TV is also proven to be one of the most successful adaptations of a popular video game, which even broke the plateau of bad receptions on Rotten Tomatoes for the type. Many believes that Shankar’s CastlevaniaNetflix series having critically praised is no coincidence because, his unique take at this horror franchise was what it needed actually helped get it a lot of attention in the first place.